Here We Go Again
by TrthIsOutThere
Summary: Post Season 3. Mystery, conspiracy, eventual LoVe. I'm not sure how to summarize this very well quite yet without giving too much away. Just give it a whirl, and I promise/hope not to disappoint.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Hello, all! So, while I'm not new to ffnet, I am new to Veronica Mars (literally. I just watched seasons 1-3 for the first time in like...March). All that means is if you want to give me a hard time in a review, go for it. Sticks and stones, mate. Also, I'm not entirely certain I've grasped the characters, so PLEASE give me suggestions if you have any. Anyways, I just had this idea that's been nagging at me, and I really wanted to get it out. It's more or less planned out, and will more than likely eventually feature LoVe, but I will warn you that it may take a bit to get there. That said, despite the fact that I'm madly in love with Logan Echolls, Piz is definitely not a bad guy and I kind of like him and Veronica together, so please don't hate me for dragging out their relationship for a few chapters. So, following and excessively long author's note and no further ado, please enjoy "Here We Go Again."

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><p>Week three of the internship came and went and there had still been no word from the now-estranged boyfriend in New York. Veronica had known this long-distance separation would wear hard on Piz; it was wearing hard on her. She felt it with each disappointing ring of her cell phone, and in every minute of each slowly passing day. Not even the case she was assisting on held her attention long enough. She checked her phone for a text or missed call on the hour, yet nothing had appeared on her phone since before she had left Neptune nearly a month before. It was this silence that awoke a sleeping monster of paranoia and distrust that had been hibernating deep in her gut and she had resisted the urge to give into the direct cause of her falling out with Logan. The resistance led to restless nights and a lack of appetite that tended to accompany matters of the broken and disappointed heart.<p>

It meant shortening the phone calls with her father and Mac. It meant "Dear Diary" emails to Wallace in Africa. It meant listening to the Break-Up Mix CD at high volumes during all hours of the day. Watching bad movies. Eating ice cream for dinner. Living in pajamas outside of work… It meant, and felt, like going through a one-sided break up. Long hours alone left with only haunting thoughts of "what ifs" and "should haves" that only serve to eat away at your soul while all you can do is stew in those poisonous, pessimistic thoughts.

On this particular night, she was dressed to the nines in fluffy slippers, cut-off sweats, _Logan's_ old American Eagle t-shirt (this had unfortunately become her comfort shirt, plaguing her with the burning question of why _Logan's _shirt of all shirts since the first time she had shrugged it on without realizing it), and an over-sized Hearst basketball hoodie Wallace had gotten her that she could drown in as she curled up on the couch. Her dinner had consisted of a particular treat; a whole peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Made with grape jelly and _Wonder bread_, of all things. There was nothing better than the stick-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth, sticky mess with a cold glass of milk on the side. Especially when you preferred to exert the least amount of energy during food preparation. This scrumptious smorgasbord was followed up with an appetizing "Cooler Ranch" Doritos and _diet_ Dr. Pepper dessert with a healthy helping of Nicholas Sparks movies between obsessive glances at her phone. It was shaping up to be a pretty regular night…which should have been a blinding neon sign that it would be anything but.

Closing in on twelve and way beyond the time she needed to have closed her eyes for a decent night's sleep, there was an obnoxious knocking at her apartment door. The glance she had at the screen of her phone was not the typical obsessive check for a text message or missed call but rather an irritated glance at the clock before she rolled off the couch and shuffled to the door. Rising up to her toes, she glanced through the peephole. Her heart lurched in her throat and began pounding behind her ribs before her heels returned to the floor. She spun around quickly and pressed herself against the door as every function of her body fell into confusion. Memories of long nights spent in at the Neptune Grande, take out dinners, spending summer days at the beach, and the back seats of SUV's flooded her mind and her heart pounded faster as she bit her lip remembering every last detail.

And sex. Lots and _lots _of wild, exciting, passionate, _amazing_ sex. Not at all similar to gentle, caring Piz. _If the cuddling is the best part, he didn't do it right. _Veronica groaned inwardly and shook her head to clear the memory.

She looked back through the peephole to reassure herself that Logan Echolls was in fact standing outside her apartment door in Fredericksburg, Virginia with an overstuffed duffel bag slung over his shoulder and a full bag of groceries from Kroger in his other hand. What was _he_ doing here? She threw the door open without so much as a greeting. "What are you doing here?" she asked coldly.

A smirk passed over his face quickly. "Well, well, well, Mars. That isn't any way to treat a houseguest." His eyes dropped to her shirt and he quirked an eyebrow before walking past her in the doorway. "Nice shirt," he tossed over his shoulder at her.

Veronica looked down and remembered the t-shirt she was wearing and quickly zipped up her hoodie all the way to her neck. She rolled her eyes and shut the door behind him, just as Logan's bag dropped heavily to the floor. She silently thanked every great power that she lived on the ground floor and watched as Logan dropped the plastic grocery bag on the coffee table, folding her arms across her chest. His eyes roved the nearly empty walls and sparsely furnished room, his characteristic smirk only briefly alighting on his mouth as his eyes passed over the uncharacteristic dirty dishes in the sink and on the table. He shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it haphazardly at the back of the couch. "It's so…_spartan_," he said, making a small explosive motion with his hands. "Chic. I _love_ what you've done with the place."

"Well, we can't all afford that high class lifestyle of hotel living now, can we?" she asked flatly.

"No," he agreed. "That's why I'm on this anthropological excursion. I came to slum with the lower classes. I wanted to learn some of their primitive survival techniques. I was hoping to hire you as my translator." He smirked again before dropping onto the couch and glancing at the television. "Oh, goodie! My favorite part."

Veronica shook her head. "What do you want, Logan?" She knew him better. _He knew_ she knew him better that this.

The bashful look that crossed his face and the way he carefully avoided her eyes by staring at his feet propped up on the coffee table forced Veronica to falter slightly. While he had his own variety of reasons for being there, he was merely using the presumed purpose as a cover to get something he needed from her. He could not admit that just yet, but eventually the real reason Logan was taking advantage of the sheriff's worry would reveal itself. "I talked to Mac," he mumbled. "She briefly mentioned she was worried about you. And for her, that's like a distress call, so I figured I'd put my millions to good use…"

Veronica bristled indignantly, irrationally annoyed both by the fact that Logan was buddy-buddy with her best friend and that he felt the need to take it upon himself once more to come to her rescue. "I'm fine. Piz is just…he's not good with this…" she hesitated looking for the right words.

"Piz is a little bitch," Logan cut in firmly, his eyes finally swinging up to meet the fire in hers. He stood his ground firmly.

Veronica's teeth ground together as she inhaled slowly, her eyes narrowing dangerously at Logan. He waved his hand dismissively and turned back to the movie. Her fists balled at her sides and she felt herself stiffen. "_What _did he ever do to you?"

Logan twisted a small lock of his hair between his fingers and shrugged. Piz had never done anything to him. Their short spat had been over a misunderstanding that led to Veronica vehemently stating she never wanted to speak to him again, but Logan had long ago slipped into the self-appointed role of Veronica's personal body guard. He followed his gut instinct without question regarding Veronica. Whether she believed that Logan was overprotective or just as crazy as his father was her own prerogative, but it was Logan's brutish, primitive methods that whisked him to East-Jesus-Nowhere, Virginia with Keith Mars' blessings to check on his lonely, slightly heart-broken daughter…

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><p><em>Logan climbed slowly out of the cold water, running a hand through his dripping hair. He propped his surfboard up in the sand and unzipped his wetsuit, shrugging it off his shoulders and leaving it to hang low on his hips. Goosebumps began to dot his arm as the brisk morning breeze traveled lazily across his flesh and the salt water stung the fresh cuts adorning his face. Grabbing the towel on the ground by his feet, he made a lazy attempt to wipe some of the water off of his torso and shook a bit more water out of his hair. His eyes roamed the nearly vacant beach, alighting on the form of Keith Mars standing a short distance away from him.<em>

_The man hadn't changed much in the months since they had last spoken; he wore a tweed suit, with a navy button-up shirt and blue striped tie beneath it. Always the professional, in or out of uniform. A set of aviator sunglasses, typical of every deputy in Balboa County, sat securely on the bridge of his nose and his feet sat snugly in a pair of well-worn brown penny loafers. He ambled over to Logan slowly, hands in his pockets, looking over the top of his frames at the waves crashing on the shore._

_Logan smiled at the other man and clasped his hands together mockingly. "Oh, Mister Mars…to what do I owe this distinguished pleasure? A house call from the brand new sheriff." _

_Keith nodded. "They say the swell is building up for tomorrow. It's nearly flat today."_

"_Surely, you didn't come all the way out here to give me tips on where to catch the best waves. Last I checked, surfing was one of the things at the top of your 'Why I Hate Logan Echolls' list."_

_The older man bit the inside of his lower lip and eyed Logan quietly for a few moments before shaking his head. "I'm here because I thought our motivation stemmed from the same source," he said pointedly._

_Logan snorted derisively and flicked sand off of his thumb, his eyes focusing on something down the beach. "So does this mean that we're friends or something?"_

_The sheriff shrugged. "It means I'm comfortable coming to you to ask for your assistance." His eyes lit up in a friendly smile that never quite made its way to his mouth._

"_I'm listening."_

"_Mac has expressed her concern to me about Veronica's current condition regarding one Stosh Piznarski…"_

_Logan's face went slack as he bristled, immediately ready for confrontation. "What did he do to her?"_

"_Calm down, Logan. She just needs a friend right now and the few that she hasn't managed to permanently piss off—" Logan chuckled, "—aren't able to get to her right now. Including me."_

"_You just want me to go visit her?"_

"_Check in on her, make sure she doesn't lose focus…"_

"_She hasn't lost focus," Logan assured him. _

"_Make sure she's eating more than chocolate ice cream and sleeping and, God forbid, make sure she's not listening to that horrible break-up mix…"_

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><p>Logan shrugged. "I just wanted to make sure you were doing okay. Mac was really…"<p>

"I'm _fine_, Logan," she insisted stubbornly. "There's nothing wrong with Piz and me. And I _certainly _would not need _you _here to help me if there was anything wrong. Not to mention the fact that, last we spoke, I'm _pretty_ sure I told you I never wanted to speak to you again. This isn't worth the argument. Just go home."

"I just got here."

"Get. Out," she said, pointing toward the door. "Just hop on your little jet and fly far, far away."

Logan shot to his feet. "I can't leave. Would you just…"

"Logan," Veronica sighed, trying to cut him off.

"Your dad wanted me to…"

"Don't do this," she warned, trying to stop him again.

"Veronica!" he exclaimed, catching her by surprise and inevitably garnering her full attention. "Would you just let me show you what I have?" He pulled a carton out of the bag on the table and handed it to her. She took the frozen carton of vanilla ice cream in her hands, first eyeing the ice cream and then Logan with something akin interested curiosity. "Your dad told me to make sure your diet consisted of more than chocolate ice cream so…there's mint chocolate chip in the bag, as well as a veritable cornucopia of scrum-diddly-umptious toppings that I left in the car. I made sure to get maraschino cherries and bananas to ensure you got your daily servings of fruit."

Veronica closed her eyes and bit her bottom lip as she smiled and shook her head. Logan watched as the icy aura that had been surrounding her since he arrived slowly began to melt. Maybe she would warm up to him in the next few days.

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><p>I hope you enjoyed it! Hopefully, I'll be posting the second chapter soon.<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

Thanks so much to all those who reviewed and subscribed! Here's Chapter 2. It might clear up some questions you had regarding the first chapter...enjoy!

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><p>The blaring ring of her alarm came far too early the next morning.<p>

Veronica groaned and rolled over, pulling the blankets over her head during her snooze period. An alarm at seven was not that early, even after having gone to sleep around one-thirty the night before. It was the repetition of this sleeping pattern was beginning to wear on her though and it became exponentially harder to wake up each day. She should not be relishing in the fact that today was Friday and that the weekend was only one long day away as she was finishing up the third week of her prized internship. She would have stayed up much later, staring blankly at the television if Logan hadn't…

_Logan!_

In her current sleep-deprived state, she had forgotten that he had randomly shown up at her apartment the night before. Suddenly all the latent irritation and anger that had built up over the last few months renewed her energy. She immediately bolted upright in bed, suddenly aware of the smell of a cooked breakfast and the delicious scent of some sort of exotic blend coffee, and threw back the comforter. The next thing she knew, she was standing behind Logan in her kitchen.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

Logan sighed and rolled his eyes, but didn't bother to face her. "I thought I made this clear last night. Mac was worried. She can't afford to come out here, so I came to check on you."

"That's rather generous of you," Veronica quipped, pulling a chair out from beneath the table and sitting in it heavily. She checked her phone for any texts or missed calls. There was only one text from her father. She suppressed a frustrated groan. It wasn't for lack of trying; she had texted Piz a few times and tried to call him as well, while still trying to maintain the distance he needed to deal with this separation. It's just that now his reaction to this separation was bordering ridiculous and their problem was standing in her kitchen making breakfast.

"I thought it was," Logan smirked.

An awkward silence settled between them and it left Veronica fidgeting to fill the void between them. She chewed her bottom lip as her eyes roved over Logan's tall frame standing in front of her stove. Of all the things she knew about him, his ability to cook had been overlooked. The food smelled delicious and everything looked surprisingly perfect as it sat on the counter on two plates. Plain white plates, not dissimilar to the ones that were found in the food court at Hearst…

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><p>"<em>Di-did Logan just apologize?" Piz asked as he sat across from Veronica.<em>

_Veronica watched as Gory Sorokin glared moodily at her from across the cafeteria, wiping at the blood trickling down his chin from his lip. Logan had left quite a bit of damage in his wake this week, but Gory was the only victim she was worried about. And not because she thought Logan's brutality was misdirected. Gory deserved every hit he received, but she hoped that he wouldn't bring this to his Russian mob boss uncle and father. She only worried about Logan, and not his victim, this time. He feared nothing anymore. He had nothing left._

_And that was the most dangerous possession Logan owned._

"_Hmm?" Veronica asked, turning back to him. Immediately, she felt the pain of his wounds and a ball of ice formed in her stomach. Logan had gone no-holds-barred on Piz's face only a couple days before, leading to his break up with his current girlfriend, Parker, and leading Piz to question his own relationship with Veronica. To Logan, it was all Veronica, all the time. Her eyes wandered to where Logan was keeping a watchful eye on Gory's every movement from the restaurant at the farthest end of the cafeteria. _

"_He's different around you, you know," Piz observed, tapping the table with his fingertips._

"_Who is?"_

"_Logan."_

_Her jaw dropped in disbelief and she frowned. This was the _last _conversation she had wanted to have today. "Piz…"_

"_Yeah. And I'm pretty sure that you're the only one that doesn't see it, V," Piz continued, looking up at her from dark eyes, shadowed even more by the bruises that surrounded them._

_Veronica scoffed and shook her head. "Logan is…he's out, Piz. I've told him. He's reckless and destructive and he sees _no_ problem with being that way. Whatever he feels about me, it's not reciprocated. He just…he _knows_ how I feel about being taped. It's not like his actions weren't unjustified."_

_Piz's eyebrows rose. "Oh, really. Yeah. Because he beat the shit out of me, Veronica. Tell me where the justification is in that. I have _never_ done anything to him, except date his ex-girlfriend. Apparently that makes me fair game, right?" Piz's face contorted slightly in angry curiosity. "Why are you sticking up for him?"_

"_I'm not," she said louder than she had intended. She made a 'stop' motion with her hands and her voice dropped. "I'm not sticking up for him."_

_Piz chuckled in disbelief and shook his head. "I can't believe this."_

"_Why are we even talking about this?" she asked softly._

"_Why are we talking about this?" he said more to himself and the air around him. "Because, _because_ something between you two isn't done," Piz said with a shrug. "I'm not saying that you haven't moved on…"_

_Veronica scoffed again and folded her arms across her chest. "Well, that's good; I'd hate to interrupt to insert that minor correction."_

_Piz blinked slowly and reached across the table to grab her elbow. "That's not what I said. You're with me, one-hundred percent. And I can see that. There's just something unresolved between you and the quicker you figure it out, the quicker we can get back to being us."_

"_Piz…" Veronica pleaded, tears covering her bright blue eyes and turning them to glass._

"_I wanted to tell you that I'm taking the internship in New York. It's a, uh, it's a great opportunity and I think that it's going to help me more than the Neptune station."_

_Veronica nodded. "I-I'm glad you chose to do that." She paused and blinked back the tears. "So… are we done until further notice then?"_

_Piz smirked and shook his head. "No, but I am going to need time to sort this out. And so will you." He leaned in and placed a chaste kiss on her lips, pulling away much too soon for her liking. It felt too much like a goodbye, and less like the promise he made immediately after. "I'll see you later, okay? Promise." She nodded mutely, for once unable to find the words she wanted to retort with or pull a joke out of her ass to lighten the moment. She watched as he walked away, turning back only once to smile and wave in typical Piz fashion. She smiled and waved, not knowing that that would be the last she saw of him…_

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><p>She shook herself out of her reverie and was back in her kitchen watching Logan making her breakfast on the complete opposite end of the country from where her mind had momentarily wandered. The awkward silence had thickened and she was now trying desperately to find something to talk about. <em>We tried to be friends, and it didn't work…<em> Veronica shook her head again. They could be friends. Logan had flown across the country to check in on her. She had to give him credit and count her blessings. There weren't that many people she had managed to keep around and if Logan was willing to overlook all the things that had gone wrong between them, she should be able to do the same.

Should be.

"Soooo…" she drawled.

"So," Logan said.

"You and Mac are, like, bee-eff-effs now? Together forever?"

Logan chuckled as he set a steaming cup of coffee in front of her, returning for the plates and setting them on the table. He sat across from her. "Eat up, kid."

Veronica dove into her meal, realizing just how hungry she was and how much better real food tasted after a steady diet of Ramen, ice cream, and toast. Logan watched her for a short moment before beginning to pick through his own plate. He thought of the time he had shown up at Mac's front door a few days before leaving for Virginia. Logan had run into the same problem Veronica had. Outside of Dick Casablancas and Heather, the eleven year old pest he had befriended, Mac was one of the few people left in his life he could trust and who could stand to have him around for more than five minutes. Even if she didn't fully appreciate the fact that his relationship with Veronica, followed by his whirlwind adventure with her roommate Parker had her straddling the fence between the two sides, she wasn't as quick to discount him. So when he needed a friend, she had been there without question, but Logan wasn't about to admit that to Veronica. "We hang out," he acknowledged with a shrug. "I'm the third wheel to the Mac and Max party on the weekends."

"Third wheel, huh? How is that working for you?"

"You know, I drive, they make out in the back of the car," Logan said. "It's like free, weekly porn." He frowned. "Though, they never quite get to the good part while they're with me."

Veronica grimaced, but laughed. "There's something wrong with you."

"What do you expect for free, right?"

They settled into an awkward silence again, cut only by the sounds of forks scraping the plates and chewing sounds. Veronica quickly finished her meal, announcing that she needed to get ready for work, and shot out of the kitchen without a second glance. Behind the safety of her bathroom door, she blew out a heavy sigh and leaned against the door, covering her face with her hands.

_What an _epic_ fail, _she thought to herself. _Come on, Veronica. It's just Logan. _She opened the door a crack and watched as Logan began picking up the plates from the table and then began washing them, along with her pile of old dishes. She shut the door again softly. _Pull it together, Veronica. Pull. It. Together. He's here as a friend. You need a friend, _try_ to admit that to yourself._ She opened the door again and stepped out in the hall in view of the kitchen. "Logan!" she called.

He turned curiously to her and raised an expectant eyebrow. "What?"

"I, um…" her voice was small as she trailed off, looking for something to quickly fill another silence. "Thanks," she said firmly and nodded. "For everything."

Logan paused and smirked, before nodding and turning around. "Okay."

To a stranger, it was an awkward exchange between two virtual strangers. But Logan and Veronica knew that the short conversation was the closest they would get to an apology and peace offering. For right now, all had been forgotten.


	3. Chapter 3

Holy crap! This has done so well, and I genuinely and greatly appreciate every single review and subscription. Thanks for filling my inbox and I hope that I can continue to appease everyone. I hope that I answered any questions that people had in my review responses, and if you have any remaining either sit back and enjoy the ride, or ask me lol. Again, burn me or praise me; sticks and stones, mate. I appreciate them all. Enjoy!

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><p>"<em>Veronica?"<em>

_Veronica looked up at the owner of the small voice reflecting in the mirror and days of being approached in the Neptune High girls' bathroom flooded her memories. Grabbing a paper towel, she dried her face of the ice cold water she had repeatedly splashed there only seconds before. Her shoulders drew back and squared as she turned to her fellow intern and walls slammed into place around her mind and soul. "Hey!" she greeted warmly. "What's up?"_

_The girls face remained concerned. "I was bringing you the files you had requested. You jumped up and ran to the bathroom so quickly; I just wanted to make sure you weren't sick." The poor girl had a lot of heart, Veronica had seen that the moment she met her and had questioned her desire to work in a physically and emotionally demanding place like the FBI. She had proven worthy two days in when she was ready to glove up at the Medical Examiner's office when the interns aiding on the same case as Veronica attended their first autopsy. Veronica was queasy and ready to hurl or maybe even pass out, she couldn't tell; Avery Hammond was ready for the hands-on segment._

_Veronica offered a tight smile and shook her head. She had jumped and ran to the bathroom quickly, though she didn't feel sick. She ran for fear that a stray tear might fall from her eyes and that someone might see. They were barely through the first week and Avery, who painfully reminded her of Meg Manning, down to her blond hair and innocent demeanor, had been the only one to see through the unrelenting sarcastic edge of everything Veronica said to people. Veronica had gone to Quantico, set on attempting to not piss anyone off, but she had also banked on Piz caving on his ridiculous "time-off" the second he stepped off the plane at LaGuardia. So when she had finally explained what was going on to her father on her way to work that morning, he had sent her his love and reassurance through text messages, the last one making her homesick enough to give up the FBI and jump on the next plane back to Neptune. All because of a boy._

_What was wrong with her?_

"_Oh, that?" Veronica asked, wrinkling her nose and waving it off. "It was nothing. Too much coffee this morning. You know how that goes…" She shrugged._

"_Okay," Avery stated apprehensively. She didn't buy a word, but wasn't planning on pushing an answer out of this girl she hardly knew. "I just wanted to make sure." _

"_I'm fine, really," Veronica assured her. _

"_Are you ready to go back then?"_

_Veronica paused, a slightly confused expression crossing her features as she realized she was ready to make a leap of faith, and quite possibly try to _befriend _someone. She shook her head slowly and felt her eyes sting. Suddenly, the words were bubbling out of her and spilling all over poor Avery before she could stop them. But Avery stood fully attentive and continually nodded in understanding. When Veronica finished her tale, she looked up at Avery through bleary eyes clouded with tears that refused to fall over Piz._

_Then Avery threw her a curve ball._

_She grabbed Veronica's forearm and squeezed it reassuringly. "Logan will be okay, Veronica," Avery told her._

_Veronica looked up at Avery alarmed. "What?"_

"_Well, Logan is the one in trouble, I just assumed that…"_

_At Veronica's raised eyebrow, Avery changed her course of conversation. "This Piz guy just sounds really cautious is all," she said without skipping a beat. "He doesn't want to get hurt. And, no offense, but you don't exactly scream soft and fluffy."_

_Veronica nodded, all sarcastic responses dying on her tongue. Her thoughts were in Neptune, momentarily forgetting all about Stosh Piznarski…_

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><p>Veronica sat at her workstation, staring blankly at the banking records on her computer screen. Her mind was reeling, repeatedly going over the events of the morning and the previous night, trying to find an unseen angle at Logan's actions. She had to constantly pull her mind away from waking up to Logan in her kitchen. It was something so domesticated, something that she had thought about on occasion several months before. The 'what if' kind of thought, had Madison Sinclair never opened her fat trap. The worst part of it was that she had <em>liked <em>it. She liked having Logan nearby, doing things for her without being asked and just because he wanted to. But something was off. Something had to be off. Surely, he wasn't just being nice.

Right?

A hot, steaming mug appeared under her nose and she inhaled the hazelnut scent deeply. "Here's your morning pick-me-up, Mars. You know you're going to have to start sleeping more…" Avery stopped as she rounded to the front of Veronica's work station and glimpsed the small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth and the refreshed look in her eyes. "Oh my God!" Avery said, earning irritated glances from their fellow interns and the ASAC in the corner. "Oh my God!" she said again in a whisper. At Veronica's confused expression, Avery grabbed her arm and pulled her into the nearby bathroom. "Piz called you?"

Veronica shook her head dumbly. "No," she denied and frowned at Avery, the sarcastic tone icing the monosyllabic word and her expression. She said it as if that was the craziest thing Avery had ever said to her. Avery's face fell and slid into confusion. "What?" Veronica asked and then wanted to smack herself, blaming Logan for interrupting her new routine and setting her off kilter.

"Well, what happened then?" Avery asked slowly. "You're smiling and looked like you actually slept last night."

Veronica hesitated for an uncomfortable amount of time. Smiling? Avery raised her eyebrows expectantly. "Logan showed up at my apartment last night."

Avery's face twisted in confusion again. "Logan?"

"Yeah, you know, Mr. Thinks-with-his-dick-and-fists?" Veronica asked. She had only mentioned Logan to Avery the one time. She didn't expect her to remember him.

"Well, what did he want?"

"He said he was concerned for me."

A smile spread slowly across Avery's features, before she cleared her throat and it vanished. Veronica tilted her head to send Avery a sideways glance that said she was nuts. "Okay, then," Avery said, stepping toward the door. Veronica didn't like the knowing smirk on her face. "Let's get back to work, shall we?"

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><p>"I can't believe it, Mac," Veronica said around a mouthful of sandwich from the Hogan's Alley deli later that day. She sidestepped the agents-in-training that were making their way to the Mock-Suburbia search and seizure scenario around the corner as she walked back to the main quad between the dormitory buildings. "He says that he came because you mentioned you were worried."<p>

"I might've said that to him at some point," Mac slurred evasively as she tried to disentangle her limbs from Max's and squinted at the clock, suppressing a groan. It was barely passed nine in Neptune, but she had answered the incessant ringing of her cell phone the third time Veronica called, fully knowing the explosion she was going to receive from the other end. How did Veronica think Logan got to the airport yesterday? She pulled one of the sheets off the end of the bed and wrapped it around herself and stepping out into the living room of Max's new apartment.

"He just _showed up_ like nothing ever happened," Veronica continued, barely registering Mac's comment. "I mean, did he _think_ that everything was going to be hunky-dory just because _he _wanted it to be? What the hell is wrong with him? You know, I _left_ Neptune this summer—" Mac rolled her eyes, "—yet somehow it follows me to the other side of the country." She chuckled derisively. "Man, they weren't kidding; you can take the girl out of Neptune…"

"But you can't take Neptune out of the girl," Mac cut in quickly, irritation icing her words. "Listen, Veronica…just keep in mind that not everyone is out to get you."

"Mac…"

"No, seriously," Mac insisted. "Logan changed a lot in the last few months, and I know that you haven't seen it, but I swear it's true. Remember Parker was my roommate. I had to watch them make out, like, every morning. Just give him a chance. As his friend."

Veronica jaw worked as she brooded in the parking lot.

After an extended pause, Mac asked, "Veronica?"

"Fine, but one fuck-up, and he's out," she said, and hung up.

Mac raised her eyebrows at the abrupt end to her phone call with her best friend. She knew of Logan's plan to approach Veronica under the guise of Mac's concern. She remembered the night he explained it to her quite clearly, seeing as he had been dropped outside Max's apartment with a dislocated shoulder and several broken ribs the week Veronica left for Virginia. So when the sheriff expressed his concern to Logan, he took that opportunity, but knew that Veronica would be more suspicious of him if he said he came because Keith Mars asked him to. He decided that Mac's concern would be validated faster by the all-knowing, witty brain of Veronica Mars. And it wasn't that Mac _wasn't_ concerned; she had never heard Veronica sound as down as she had over the last few weeks. In fact, the verbal lashing she woke up to was a welcome relief. At least Logan took her mind off of the black hole formerly known as Stosh Piznarski.

But Logan was in serious trouble. And he was banking on the fact that Veronica never turned him down when he asked for help.

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><p>lol I just realized that a lot of stuff happened in the nearly four weeks that Veronica had been out of Neptune (a week to unpack and move in, three of internship) and that my time line is all kinds of messed up. So, we'll say this: The incident in the cafeteria was about five weeks before this fic began (which makes Piz a GIANT douche bag, since I said that was the last time he and Veronica spoke), Mac found Logan mysteriously dumped outside Max's apartment the week after (instant renewed friendship between the three of them), Keith Mars approached Logan at the beach two weeks later (that's four weeks into this five week period), and Logan showed up in Virginia in that fifth week. WHEW! Glad I worked that out haha because I think it may or may not be necessary for the next chapter...<p> 


	4. Chapter 4

lol Well I tried to get another chapter in earlier, but my sister ended up contracting bacterial pneumonia and going to the hospital. What a misfortune. Anyways, I set you up to just take digs at Piz all day long with chapter. So go ahead. Burn him. Call him a sissy. Do whatever it takes to fill my inbox with my beloved reviews and I'll try to start working on the next update within the next days or so.

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><p><em>One Week Earlier...<em>

What was _going_ on?

Piz knew he had taken this temporary vow of silence too far. Veronica had stopped calling and texting several days before and he knew that whatever trust she had in him would eventually turn into an avalanche crashing down the side of a mountain, and it would leave him standing cold and alone. Veronica would move on, if she hadn't begun to already, and leave him in the dust without so much as a glance in the rearview mirror and build a few more walls around that small part of her that could belong to only one person. And try as he might, he wasn't entirely certain that Veronica would give him the key.

He had seen it that day in the cafeteria when Logan beat the crap out of Gory Sorokin.

The look that passed between Logan and Veronica had lasted only a split second to any passerby, but for Piz it lasted long enough for his world to come crashing down around him. The way their eyes had locked, the inscrutable expression on Veronica's face, the look of smug triumph on Logan's brow…Piz wished that Logan had just peed a giant circle around her. It was the exact same thing. For Logan, it would always be Veronica. Whether he could see that or not, he had proven it through the bruises and broken bones he left in his wake the week That Video circulated around campus.

And Piz knew that eventually, if Logan kept fighting, he'd win. He'd win for good. And Veronica would go with him and never look back. Piz wasn't a fighter and he hated himself for it. He knew that if he fought as hard and as long as Logan, then eventually the choice would fall on Veronica, and he couldn't do that to her. This is what kept Piz from picking up the phone text after text, call after call, day after day, week after week. He knew that at some point he would have to sever the connection between them and he had yet to steel himself enough to do such a dirty deed.

So he let the days pass by slowly and kept his phone as far away from him as he possibly could, removing the temptation to contact her, to hear her voice, to hear her tell him how much she missed him and wished that she could see him. She would be sincere enough, and it would kill him, literally rip his heart out of his chest and squeeze it tightly in cold, cruel, sinister fingers. He wasn't ready for that. He wasn't sure he'd ever be ready for that.

Maybe tomorrow, he told himself for what seemed the millionth time. Maybe tomorrow.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: OMG! When will Veronica realize? lol She's still trying to fool herself unfortunately. Thanks again for all the reviews/subscriptions! Here, of course, is the next installment. I apologize for yet another short chapter...I'm hoping, hoping, hoping that I will have time to get a longer chapter out soon. This is kind of a filler chapter, but it sets up the next one quite nicely.

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><p>The mad bureaucratic evening drive, locally known as Rush Hour, had every route back to Veronica's apartment gridlocked because of one tiny accident at the junction of Route 17 and I-95. What was normally a fifty minute drive turned into a massive route of detours around traffic and over back roads that paralleled the main road. When she finally arrived home, her trip had taken a whole extra forty minutes. What an epic ending to an epic fail of a day. After hanging up with Mac, the ASAC had sent out an email explaining that the prime suspect of the serial case they had been working on had managed to flee local police custody in the short time period that it took the U.S. Marshalls to arrive on scene. The interns hadn't been a major contributing force in the case, but they had invested a lot of time and energy in it. The news had been slightly disheartening, to say the least. Veronica, of course, took it personal and began pouring through every file she could get her hands on to find <em>something<em> that might help.

It turned out fleeing fugitives are not as easy to track as cheating husbands.

By the time she finally pulled into the parking lot, she was ready to kick her shoes off and fall asleep on the couch. She trudged up to the front door and clumsily shoved the key into the deadbolt. When she pushed the door open, she was met with the sounds of gunfire and strange explosions emitting loudly from her television. She froze in the doorway, staring at the back of Logan's head as his long form lounged across her couch, the only movement was in his thumbs as he dumbly controlled the…what was it? A Gatling gun? _Some_ sort of gun and the hands holding it on the television screen.

"Hey, I hope you don't mind," he said suddenly acknowledging her presence in the doorway. She hadn't even realized his brain was doing more than melting out of his ears. "There's not much to do here during the day."

Her response was to shut the door and drop her keys in the bowl by the door. She kicked her shoes off and tugged her shirt out of the waist of her pants as she walked over to the back of the couch. The box and packaging for a brand new Xbox 360 lay strew about her living room floor, as well as the cases for several games, an extra controller, and two wireless guitar remotes. His duffle bag in the corner had clothes hanging out of the unzipped opening and the blanket she had given him for the night was thrown haphazardly over the back of the love seat adjacent to the couch he was sitting on. Was this supposed to be her feel-good entertainment for the weekend? Watch Logan play video games the whole time? "What are you doing?" she asked, bracing her hands on the back of the couch and leaning forward curiously.

The game paused and he turned to face her. "Waiting for you," he said it as if that was the most obvious answer.

"Did you just go out and buy an Xbox?"

"Yes." He nodded. "And some games. Like this fake _Lord of the Rings_ shithole of a game."

"Have you played video games _all day_?"

"Nope," he said vaguely, resuming his game. Veronica sighed and shook her head in exasperation. _Just give him a chance. As a friend._ Mac's words echoed annoyingly in her ears as she walked into the kitchen and yanked the fridge open. Her knuckles whitened around the handle and her teeth ground together as she searched the contents of the fridge for something to drink. There were considerably more choices than there had been that morning. Had he gone _grocery shopping_? Veronica stared at him over the door for a brief moment before pulling a bottle of water off of the top shelf and taking a long, satisfyingly cool sip.

Logan's head turned slightly toward her, but his eyes never left the television. "Hey, Veronica," he called.

Every muscle tensed as she prepped for him to make some obtuse request, like making him a sandwich. Her teeth ground together again. _Just give him a chance._ "Hmm?" she answered sweetly.

"I, uh, I made some reservations tonight. We have to leave soon. I didn't expect you to get back so late." He finally looked at her, his eyes soulful and sparkling, his characteristic, annoyingly charming hint of a smirk flirting with the lines of his face and shrugged. "Sorry." He looked at the watch on his wrist and that was the first time she noticed his button-up black shirt, the sleeves rolled up just below his elbows, revealing irresistible sun-kissed forearms and his vintage wash jeans that fit perfectly in all the right places. Veronica eyes widened slightly as she was momentarily speechless, her exhausted mind unable to process both Logan's unanticipated attractiveness and his curve-ball reservation comment.

"Veronica?" he asked, his right eyebrow cocked.

"Sorry, I felt like I just walked into the romantic comedy from hell. What did you say?" she asked. Everything was weird. It was just…weird. It was like déjà vu. But not. Because Logan _rarely_ did things like make reservations. Was this his end game? Woo her away from her estranged boyfriend by appealing to her vulnerable gooey center with things like _dinner reservations_? She shook her head and effectively shook away the unwanted hold Logan had momentarily had on her. _Piz_, no matter how frustrating he was being, was who she was dating. Logan had ruined his chances. Fool her once, shame on him. Fool her twice, and he's out forever. And Logan knew that. She would be amicable for dinner and until his plane took off and whisked him back to California, out of her hair. But amicable was all she was willing to offer. Maybe less than that. _Cordial. _Cordial was more than enough. It was only dinner, right? Between friends?

"We have to leave in like thirty minutes," Logan repeated shortly. He went back to playing the supposed "shithole of a game" and Veronica rolled her eyes. Just dinner. With Logan Echolls.

She slammed her bedroom door shut.

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><p>AN 2: Silly Veronica! Whew! Okay. So not quite yet, but soon, we'll get back to that whole Logan being dropped at Max's door step. What is Veronica Mars if she's not knee deep in some sort of mystery right? But I have to drop a tasty little treat in here first. Stay tuned!


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Sorry this took so long! Okay, so we have SO MANY things going on here, including a longer chapter. It's like almost 4K words. And as always, I hope that it pleases everyone that reads it and thanks for all the reviews/subscriptions. Logan and Veronica might be slightly OOC; they felt a little off to me. Point out anything out of place so I can fix it! Enjoy!

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><p>Veronica had finally managed to get ready with no help from Logan. He had repeatedly knocked on her door to check if she was ready, which finally forced her to express her irritation verbally, telling him that she would be ready when she was ready. He mumbled an apology and resumed his earlier position on the couch, his brain melting out of his ears, and eyes glued to the screen. She had emerged several minutes later, without so much as a second glance from Logan before he pushed her out the front door and into his rental waiting at the curb, the low rumble of the idling engine vibrating somewhere deep in her chest.<p>

She now sat in the passenger seat of the black Mustang observing every square inch of every surface in the car. They had been driving for nearly forty-five minutes and she had long since memorized every dent or mark made on the rental's interior. Any distraction was welcome; she wanted to avoid small talk at all costs. So far they had done a remarkable job avoiding each other and simply listening to music, lasting nearly all the way to Lorton before either said anything.

"So this is like a record silence for you," Logan remarked from beside her. She could hear the smirk in his voice; she didn't even have to look at his face to see it.

Veronica set her jaw and shook her head, snorting in derisive disbelief. "I don't talk that much, Logan," she said calmly. His voice was starting to sound like nails on a chalkboard. She wished Piz would just text her so Logan could go back home to Neptune. Maybe even go surf off the coasts of South America like he had been planning before Dick's plans fell through. The further away the better.

"Okay," Logan nodded, pursing his lips and drumming nervously on the steering wheel. They settled back into the awkward silence that had plagued them that morning. After several long moments, Logan finally broke the silence. "I- I get it, you know. I get it."

This caused Veronica to pause and she pulled her eyes from the monotony of retaining walls and street lamps that lined the sides of the road. They landed squarely on Logan, a deep frown etched in the lines above her eyes. "What do you get?" she asked, sighing.

"I get why you're so mad at me," he said, but charged on before she could muster up a response. "I'm not dense, Veronica. I hear everything you say. But there're just some things…" his teeth ground together and he gripped the steering wheel with white-knuckled fists. "Maybe I'm going through some stuff too, okay? Maybe I need a friend just as much as you do." He paused briefly, considering his next words. "And I honestly don't have all that many of them."

"Shocker!" Veronica mumbled beside him.

"You don't have very many either," he shot back at her pointedly. She tried to sink deeper into the seat, knowing that he had a point.

"It's not your job, Logan!" she exploded, turning on him so quickly that the car jerked over the yellow line momentarily. "Last I checked, you don't have any white, shining armor."

"Well, neither do you, Veronica!" Logan argued back. "You're not bullet proof."

"So we're back to this again?" she asked heatedly. "This all boils down to the exact same reason that I was mad at you in the first place. I'm _sooooo_ done with your overbearing need to protect me. Way to understand why I'm mad at you." She folded her arms across her chest and stared out the windshield so he couldn't see the angry tears pooling in her eyes. "It's not your job…" she protested quietly.

"No, it's your jerk-off boyfriend's job," Logan quipped angrily. "Stellar job he's doing, seeing as he's the source of all your problems right now."

"Well, that should feel vaguely familiar, shouldn't it?" she shot back. "This is all _your _fault anyway."

"Oh, really, Ronnie? I'm on the edge of my seat. Don't keep me waiting forever. Tell me how _I_ have ruined _your _perfect little relationship with the nicest guy in the world."

Veronica's jaw dropped open and her eyes narrowed angrily, ready with an angry retort, but she shut it quickly, her teeth clicking together. Her eyes swung out the front windshield again. The car settled into silence aside from the sounds of the DJ signing off the air on the local Top 40 station. _This_ silence felt normal; they had been here before several times. This was certainly mounting to be an epic fight, and Veronica could only wonder sardonically if this was the epic Logan had been talking about at his Anti-Prom party the year before. She found it interesting that at this point, she couldn't remember anything good about her relationship with Logan, but wasn't that the way it went? In the heat of an argument with someone you…_care_ about, you can only think of the things they've done wrong? The numerous ways they've disappointed you, or let you down, letting distrust rear its ugly head right in your face. She shook her head against those thoughts and then took a deep breath. "He says that you and I have things to work through before he and I can go back to being us," she said in an uncharacteristically small voice, picking at the invisible lint on her jeans.

The car came to an immediate stop on the shoulder. Logan threw the car in park and turned to look at her, reaching over to turn her chin and forcing her to look at him. "Then let's fix it, V. Let's fix it now."

"How?" she asked, secretly pleased that this had not escalated any further. She didn't have the energy for it.

Logan shrugged. "I don't know. But I can stay here for as long as it takes." He watched her carefully, reading every micro-expressional change that crossed her features in the fading sunlight. _I have to stay here; we might as well make the best of it. Make it somewhat constructive…_ There was a hint of a grateful smile on her face, the smile he had only seen her make for him on multiple occasions. He could see it tugging at the corners of her eyes as her deep blue irises sparkled up at him for the first time in…months. An invisible hand squeezed tightly around his heart reminding him not to fall for it, that she was unavailable to him. He had to fight every natural inclination to touch her reassuringly. The distance between them decreased dramatically as Logan subconsciously moved closer to Veronica.

Veronica was just as oblivious to the small distance between. They leaned over the center console, only inches away from each other, their limbs threatening to brush each other if either moved so much as a fraction of an inch. It was a comfort zone for them. Here they were able to be themselves with each other, in this place only known by them, the place they had been in the numerous good times that were starting to play across her memory, each of which involved intimately close physical proximity. She acquiesced to his statement with a small nod as she dissected the atoms of the center console with her eyes, avoiding his gaze as much as she could. He smirked at the hair on the top of her head. She finally looked up, her blue eyes locking intensely with his brown ones, opening herself fully to him. "Why?" she whispered.

Logan shrugged and their arms brushed together, sending an electric shock through him and forcing her to suppress every warm feeling she felt. "I'm trying to do the right thing."

Veronica sat back in her seat, nodding.

Logan recognized the unspoken apology between them and pulled back out into the I-95 traffic. He stole glances at her for the rest of the trip, but what he couldn't see was the smile she was hiding by chewing on her lower lip. Maybe this _could_ work. Maybe.

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><p>"So, what's good here?" Veronica asked scanning through the menu. She sighed, seeing that most of the food was listed in Spanish. This would take extra energy she still didn't have just to read the menu.<p>

Logan's shoulders hunched in a shrug behind his menu. "No idea. It just looked nice online."

Veronica flipped the menu closed to read the cover. "'Ceiba Restaurant,'" she read aloud. "'Contemporary Latin Cuisine.'"

"Where are the burritos?" Logan asked distractedly, flipping the menu back and forth grandiosely.

Veronica hid a smirk by ducking lower behind her menu. Once her composure was regained, she laid the menu down and folded her hands in front of her, leaning forward. "That's Mexican," she said, knowing full well she was playing into his ruse of 09-er cluelessness.

"What's the difference? I thought that was the only kind of Latin…"

A waiter cleared his throat from beside them and they looked up at the caramel-skinned twenty-something man with a slightly displeased and offended look on his face. Veronica immediately tried to apologize. "I'm so sorry. He's not really a bigot, I promise," she said, eyeing Logan pointedly and resisting the urge to kick his shin beneath the table. "He just has no control over what comes out of his mouth."

The waiter offered a toothy smile. "Don't worry," he said with a perfect American accent. "Most of us Latinos look the same. I'm Puerto Rican though. We know we're better than the rest." His posture relaxed and so did Veronica. She smiled up at him gratefully.

"I like this guy," Logan said, throwing an extremely pleased look at Veronica. She rolled her eyes.

The waiter chuckled and shook his head. "My name is Berto, I'll be looking after you tonight. Could I start you all off with something to drink?"

"If I tip you well, will you promise not to look at my ID?" Logan asked.

"Logan!" Veronica hissed. She looked up at the waiter. "He's kidding."

Berto leaned in conspiratorially. "What do you have to bargain with?"

"A famous last name," Logan joked. "And a few friends named Benjamin Franklin." Veronica put her hand to her forehead to shade her face from view and pulled the menu closer to her face. She could hear Logan shift in his seat and then visualized him pulling out the stack of hundred dollar bills she knew was in his back pocket. This wasn't her first Logan Echolls rodeo, though he was being a lot more subtle than he had been in years past. Once he found out how embarrassed Veronica got when he waved around his last name and money, he used every opportunity he was given to make her squirm. She _hated_ that he had that effect on her. There was a hushed conversation on the other side of the menu where Veronica could hear, "I'll see what I can do, Mr. Echolls," and "You're a good man, Berto," before the waiter straightened and nodded.

Veronica dropped her menu down, immediately met with Berto's perfect toothy smile again. She attempted to return his smile. "You are a very lucky lady, señorita," the waiter said.

"Oh no," Veronica said through a nervous laugh. "No. He's not my…" she said as Berto disappeared into the crowd and she felt her jaw muscles tighten again as she turned to glare at Logan.

He showed her his palms and shook his head. "I had nothing to do with that assumption."

It didn't take very long for their food to arrive and they ate greedily, making amicable small talk between bites of food. They even laughed. Veronica found it refreshing and Logan found it relieving. It let him know that when the opportunity to ask for her help finally presented itself, it would be that much easier to do. Everything was going extremely well.

That was until her phone went off by her hand.

She barely noticed the slight vibration next to her until Logan pointed out that her phone kept going off. When she looked down to see what was going on, she was assailed with a flood of several different emotions all at once. She wanted to laugh and cry and scream and groan all at the same time. Piz was finally opening a line of communication with her. Her food caught in her throat and she coughed in response, taking a long sip of her water.

"Surprise, surprise," Logan said, barely glancing at her. "I'm going to take a wild guess and say that's the man of the hour."

Veronica shot him a disapproving frown before, sliding her chair out from beneath the table and quickly excusing herself from the table. "Piz?" she asked excitedly as she answered the phone. The words that followed poured out of her mouth so quickly, they barely registered before they left her lips. "I'm _so_ glad you finally called me. I miss you. It's been _way_ too long. How has the internship been?"

"I miss you, too," he said robotically from the other end of the line.

Veronica paused, frowning. "Piz, what's wrong?" She knew he would still be reserved when he finally called, but she honestly hadn't known what else to expect when she finally did get to talk to him again. When the phone rang, relief was the first emotion that escaped her and she had wanted to let him know that everything was okay, that there had been nothing to work out with Logan.

"Veronica…" he started with a sigh, taking all her breath with one word and leaving her feeling like a Mack truck had run her over. Every muscle in her body reflexively constricted bracing for the impact. Desperately, she fought the tears pooling in her eyes and the empty feeling that was creeping into the pit of her stomach, twisting it into a tangle of knots. She knew this tone and she knew that her name would be followed with some cliché phrase like, "we need to talk." Everyone used it in the movies and on T.V. It was sad, regretful, pained, perhaps even a bit gravelly depending on how much agony the speaker was in. It was like the voice of the relationship Grim Reaper and Veronica didn't see any bright lights at the end of this tunnel.

Piz was breaking up with her.

"This, um," he started. She could see the pain on his face from about two hundred and thirty miles away. "This isn't going to work out…"

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><p><em>Piz was walking through the parking garage at the end of his shift at the station's morning show to his car. He fumbled a bit with his keys, phone, papers, and messenger bag, dropping his keys while searching for the one that unlocked his doors. The phone slipped from between his shoulder and his ear and he hissed a curse before apologizing to the person on the other end of the line. He shifted everything he was carrying to a more stable arrangement and bent down to pick up his phone. He kept stuttering into the phone as he slid his key into the lock on the door. When his phone was pulled from where it was resting on his shoulder, he spun around to see which mentor was trying to mess with him.<em>

_But there was no mentor there._

_He backed into his car and threw his hands over his face in a frenzied movement, dropping everything he was carrying to the ground, and watched through his raised arms as Logan Echolls hung up on his conversation. When he realized he wasn't in any danger and that Logan was making no effort to come after him, he put his hands down and motioned shortly at the phone in Logan's hand. "Dude, that was my mom."_

_Logan watched Piz squirm under his gaze for a few minutes, before tapping the phone in the palm of his other hand. He watched him carefully for several more seconds before he nodded, and handed the phone back to Piz as it started to ring."I'm not going to hit you, dude." _

_Piz took the phone cautiously and ignored the call. He stood up straight and faced Logan bravely. Could anyone really blame him for being gun shy around the guy? His ribs started to ache. "What do you want then?"_

"_I want you to make up your mind, Piz," Logan said evenly._

"_What are you, like- like my fairy godmother? Are you going to bestow some major cognizance upon me, or something?"_

_Logan smirked. "Can't, sorry. I forgot my wand today." He shook his head. "You're killing her right now. Just dump her or call her. Stop doing this Purgatory shit."_

_Piz hesitated. "It's more complicated than that."_

"_I know," Logan nodded and looked down at his shoes, "and it's my fault. Parker pointed that out to me pretty clearly a few weeks ago." His eyes swung back up to Piz's. Piz saw something in Logan's eyes buried deep beneath the sincerity that backed up his words. There was something different in them, something that had never been there before. What was it? Worry maybe? Sadness? No. _Fear. _Logan was afraid of something. "You're good for her. You can give her so much that I could never…"_

_Piz chuckled in disbelief and shook his head. "You don't get it, do you?" He stepped toward Logan and, for once, forced him to back away. "It will always be you, Logan." He stuffed his hands in his pockets and shrugged. "It's always been you. That's why I had to walk away. I can't force her to choose." He shook his head again. "That's what it's going to come down to, you know? A choice."_

"_Between you and me?" Logan asked, pointing to Piz and then to his own chest incredulously. "She's going to choose you, Piznarski."_

_Piz ran his tongue along his lower lip and shook his head, raising his hands in defeat. "Alright, dude, sure. Whatever." He spun around and climbed into his car. "I'll see you around, Logan." He was gone soon after, leaving Logan without the ability to respond._

_Logan stood in the garage until he could no longer hear the squealing of Piz's tires, hands limp at his sides, going over the conversation that just took place over and over in his head. Whatever the end result, he just wished Piz would make up his mind. His hands balled into fists and he refrained from hitting the closest object within swinging distance. Piz had really brought out a part of him he had gotten really good at hiding away…_

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><p>Logan's thoughts drifted to that morning as he lounged back in his chair, twisting a corner of the white cloth napkin between the pads of his finger and thumb. He had hopped a chartered plane to New York shortly after Veronica had run out the door that morning and found the station where his internship was after a quick cab ride. The Xbox purchase had been a ruse created to make Veronica think that he had done little else that day. There was no reason to raise her suspicions. He could only be relieved that, no matter what choice Piz had finally made, Veronica would be able to pull out of this rut she was in.<p>

He couldn't stand seeing her that way.

Berto was quickly rounding his way through the tables back to Logan. Logan's eyes followed him up to where he stopped. He looked up expectantly.

"Hey, man…" Berto said, hooking a thumb over his shoulder. "Your girl just ran out of here crying."

Logan stood up. "Which way did she go?"

"She was headed toward the Mall, I think."

Logan stared at Berto expectantly.

"Toward the giant-ass white Pencil, man! Come on!"

Logan pulled his wallet out and pulled three hundreds out of the billfold and shook Berto's hand, inconspicuously slipping the bills into it. "That should take care of everything." Logan quickly made his way out of the restaurant and out on the main street, looking in all directions for the petite blond on the run. Finally, he spotted her nearly a block in front of him and he took off running down the street, oblivious to the cars honking at him as he crossed the intersection. "Veronica!" When she didn't stop, he called again. "Veronica, wait!"

She stopped with her back to him and he could see her squaring her shoulders and wiping away the tears cascading down her cheeks. He slowed to a stop and she turned to face him, breathing deeply.

"Where are you going?" he asked softly.

"I, uh, I just needed some air," she lied. He knew it. She didn't bother to make it convincing. Tears gathered in the corners of her eyes and one escaped down her cheek.

"Hey," Logan said, his hand landing on her shoulder. "It's okay. I know you have a chewy, nougaty center."

She nodded, a sob escaping before she could do anything to stop it. Logan opened his arms and invited her in. Eagerly, she stepped into Logan's embrace and he enveloped her small form with his arms. She cried into his shoulder and he held her tightly. They stood like that for what seemed like forever. For all that had happened between them, it was easily forgotten in that moment when Veronica's world was falling down again.

"Let's go," Logan said, after a length of time had passed.

"No, Logan," her voice held a warning, as she stepped back in alarm.

"What?"

She sniffed and wiped her eyes. "You can't just go and put a fist in his face."

Logan frowned at her. "I was going to say that we could walk around. I wasn't aware that beating his face in was an option."

"It's not," Veronica assured him.

"Okay, then," Logan said, that irresistible smirk playing on his face again as he offered her his arm.

She took it hesitantly and they started down the sidewalk. "Where are we going?"

"I was thinking we could start at that giant-ass white Pencil thing…"


	7. Chapter 7

Meh...so this might be slightly OOC? I'm just trying to get to the LoVe. You know the deal. Like it or not, leave me a review. I cater to those reviews as best as I can. Sorry it's short.

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><p>Logan stuffed his hands in his pockets as they walked silently around the Tidal Basin. His eyes scanned the cityscape around him, taking in the well-lit well-known monuments that he had only seen once before on a brief tour in elementary school. Around the bend in the path, the pure white marble of the Jefferson Memorial contrasted with the drab tan federal office buildings behind it and the purple sky, hazy with city lights. The water was still and the park around them was silent, making it hard to believe they were in the center of the country's capital city. There were only a few people, couples mostly, and the occasional group of obnoxious twenty-somethings shrieking with laughter as they stumbled down the outer path with shoes in one hand and a paper bag in the other.<p>

He walked neither relishing, nor hating the silence; the moment was only made uncomfortable by his present petite company. Sideways glances only warned him to keep his mouth shut and let her be the first one to speak; he could literally feel Veronica seething beside him. She had every right to be angry. Who leads a person on for nearly _five weeks_ and thinks that the reconnection call is perfect for a break up? Logan's fists tightened in his pockets. Maybe he should have knocked Piz around preemptively that morning.

They walked silently for several more minutes until they came to the steps of the Jefferson Memorial where Veronica hesitated before turning and climbing up several steps and dropping down onto the cool, white marble. Logan followed and sat beside her, lounging back against the marble, his long limbs spanning across several steps. He watched carefully as she rested her elbows on her knees and propped her chin on her fist. She heaved a heavy sigh, leaving her looking less tense and more morose. "I wouldn't blame you if you hated me," her voice was so small he could barely hear her.

"What?" he queried confused.

She turned slightly. "I wouldn't blame you if you hated me," she repeated, her voice much stronger the second time.

"That doesn't even make sense," he said. "Why would I hate you?"

She shook her head. "Logan, I've been so horrible to you for the last few months. I don't know why you would want to speak to me anymore."

He sat up and shook his head, chuckling. "You…you don't get it, do you?"

She looked at him with a blank expression that only told him to continue.

Logan took a deep breath and sat forward. Might as well just blurt it out. "I _love_ you. I care about you _so_ much, Veronica," he said, wrapping his fingers around her elbow tightly. "We've been through so much…but sometimes…"

Her eyes traveled from his fingers to his eyes where she tried to pick apart his brain as he spoke slowly and carefully, causing him to trail off for a brief moment. "Oil and water," she muttered beside him.

Logan nodded. "Yeah, you know…for a long time, I've felt like it was me against the world. Duncan was so mellowed out on his anti-epilepsy meds, Dick is…"

"Dick?" Veronica supplied, a small smile crossing her face.

"Yeah, Dick is Dick," he said, nodding. "They never got it, but you never really could give up on me. I just…I thought I should pay you the same respect, you know? When the world was falling down around me, you were there to make sure I wouldn't go down with it."

"Well, it just wouldn't have been very polite of me to let you drown," she quipped gently, smiling and using her thumb to wipe beneath her eyes.

"So does this mean we're good?" Logan asked after a long pause.

Veronica nodded. "Yeah," she whispered, hooking her arm through his elbow. "We're good."

"Friends, then?" Logan asked, offering out his hand.

She laughed for the first time in a while and shook his proffered hand. "Friends."


	8. Chapter 8

So...I realize that this update has been promised for...ever. I'm so sorry! I lost my muse and then got busy working over the summer, which melted into the new school year and this is the first time I've felt somewhat inspired in MONTHS. Don't kill me. All inconsistencies and mistakes are mine obviously, and I really hope this doesn't suck too bad. I'll try to adjust for inconsistencies as I continue writing. I'm not promising a quick update, but I'm going to try to get something up in less than a month.

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><p>"<em>Logan Echolls."<em>

_Logan turned slowly at the sound of his name, though as his eyes met the person saying it, he frowned, not recognizing the face. "Maybe. Some days I like to go by Derek Zoolander. It's not easy being this ridiculously famous and good-looking."_

_The man was lanky, maybe two inches taller than Logan. His voice was heavily accented and he wore jeans and a simple leather jacket. Logan didn't miss the gun holstered under his arm either. His somewhat unassuming new friend just became more threatening. Logan felt the hair prick on the back of his neck. The man's face never changed from the no-nonsense scowl he was giving Logan. He waited patiently for Logan to admit who he was._

"_What do you want?" Logan acknowledged._

"_We have business," the man said simply._

"_Concerning a certain spoiled Mafioso's son?"_

"_You picked wrong family, now we have business," the man said stepping closer. "Get in car." He continued to scowl, but jerked his head to the car he was standing beside._

_Logan shrugged. He had nothing left. He smirked and turned, continuing his way through the Neptune Grand's parking garage. _

"_Echolls!" The man called, straightening his back and following Logan across the garage._

"_Do whatever you want, dude," Logan threw over his shoulder. "It won't make a difference." He didn't even have time to react before he felt the blinding blow to the back of his head. He crumpled to the ground, passing out before he even hit the pavement._

_When he woke up, he found himself in a sitting position. His hands and feet were tied securely to a chair in a plush office. Muffled voices filtered through the walls of an adjoining room. His breath came in short, panicked gasps and he yelled into the tape covering his mouth, trying to jerk his hands free of the restraints. This only made them cut deeper into the flesh of his wrists and nervous sweat beaded on his forehead. His eyes darted around the room trying to find something to help him break free and run. The door opened and he turned wide eyes to the man standing in the door way._

_It was a different man than who had approached him in the parking garage earlier. This one was much more like the type seen in the movies. The muscle. He was big; a tall, solid wall of muscle. He said nothing as he strode into the room, straight toward Logan. A second later, Logan's face burned where the duct tape had been ripped off his skin and he grunted quietly, shaking his head vigorously to ease the sting. _

"_The boss said you beat up his son." His voice was low and gravelly, again the stereotype. His accent was merely a trace, but he still had the mouth-full-of-marbles accent that is characteristic of Russians. The first blow was delivered to Logan's jaw, hard enough to draw a serious amount of blood from his lip with the first hit. "His son is baby. Can't take punch." His fist came down again, knocking Logan and the chair over. He pulled a knife and cut his hands and feet free. _

_Logan climbed to his feet, but not without getting kicked in the ribs first. He stumbled to the side and coughed before turning to face the no-name grunt. "Gory defamed my friend."_

"_The blond," the man nodded. "Boss knows." He hit Logan again, sending him to the floor. "Boss say, Gory need to become a man." Another blow to the ribs sent Logan into a coughing fit and he curled into the fetal position. "He tell me, keep Echolls breathing." He grabbed Logan's arm and pulled him to his feet, the wrenched the arms behind his back and threw him against the wall, pinning him there with all his body weight. The man jerked Logan's arm causing something to pop and Logan groaned loudly. The man leaned forward and whispered in Logan's ear, "But make him wish you had killed him." He twisted Logan's arm again, and this time Logan screamed._

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><p><em>Hours, days, minutes…they swirled together. Time had gone in and out with his consciousness. He finally woke up to a sterile environment and the steady beeping of a heart rate monitor. Mac was sitting beside his bed in a chair, trying not to doze off. Dick was sprawled, passed out on the couch. The second full consciousness hit him, he shot up in the bed, yelling the name of the one person he feared would suffer in all of this.<em>

"_Veronica!"_

_The heart rate monitor went crazy. Mac was at his side in an instant, grabbing his hand and telling him that everything was alright. Dick rolled off the couch, startled by Logan's outburst, and stumbled to the bed to try to help Mac. Pain shot through his ribs and shoulder and tears blurred his vision. A nurse ran in from the hallway, demanding that he calm down, but it was Mac that finally grabbed his attention. She grabbed his face firmly in her hand and jerked his head toward her, forcing him to meet her eyes._

"_Veronica's fine, Logan!" Mac said firmly. He was caught off-guard by the authoritative tone and he paused. She took that opportunity to continue. "She's in Virginia. Nothing happened to her."_

_Logan slumped back against the mattress, his breaths still coming in short gasps. The nervous sweat had beaded on his forehead again. He nodded after a moment. Mac sent the nurse away quickly. They all sat quietly for a moment._

"_What happened, bro?" Dick finally ventured._

_Logan shook his head, gingerly running his hand across his battered ribs. "How did I get here?" he asked quietly._

_Mac and Dick exchanged worried glances. _

"_You don't remember?" Mac asked cautiously, her usual quiet, hesitant tone returning._

_Logan shook his head, but stared down at the cotton blanket covering his legs._

"_They dropped you off in front of the apartment building Max lives in," Mac said._

"_They?" Logan asked, trying to piece together foggy memories._

"_The Sorokins," Dick said. "You really got yourself in a mess, dude. They're the wrong family to fuck with, man."_

_Logan's head rolled back against the mattress behind his head. He chuckled bitterly. "The Sorokins." He looked up as tears blurred his vision again. "They told me to keep my girlfriend in check. If she makes another threat…" Logan shook his head. "She never did anything to him. She restrained herself. I saw it."_

_Mac grabbed his hand, a worried expression clouding her features. "She'll be fine," she tried to assure him, though she didn't sound so sure herself. "Even Veronica wouldn't mess with the Russian mob."_

_Logan sent Mac the most skeptical look he could muster._

"_Not directly anyway…"_

"_I have to go see her."_

"_Logan..." Even Dick knew this was the worst idea his best friend had developed._

"_Logan Echolls?"_

_They all turned to the door to see Leo D'amato and another deputy standing in the doorway._

"_Yes?" Logan said._

"_A minute of your time."_

_Logan, Mac, and Dick exchanged glances, but said nothing. Mac and Dick left quietly. Once they were gone, Leo and the other deputy entered the room and shut the door. "Mr. Echolls, you're being charged for possession with the intent to distribute sixty thousand dollars worth of cocaine we found in your hotel room. For the time being you will be kept here, once you've healed enough you will be transferred to the jail for further questioning. Consider yourself under arrest. Don't go anywhere…"_

* * *

><p>Saturday and Sunday passed by peaceably. Logan played video games and complained about the District's infamous humidity and smog. Veronica watched him silently as she cleaned, or read, or just milled about the room trying to find something to keep her attention. They had gone out again on Saturday night, but to the nearby amusement park. Just for a change of scenery. Aside from their field trip, it was quiet. Comfortable. Veronica didn't mind Logan's presence so much and Logan seemed to lose the air of pompousness that had followed him around for the last several months.<p>

They had stumbled upon (perhaps rediscovered?) a mutual understanding of each other. A heavy gate had been lifted between them.

When Monday morning came around, Veronica had gone through her morning routine with a slight bounce in her step. Work passed by quickly (maybe because of the hour early release) and even the traffic didn't bother her that afternoon for once. She opened her apartment door to a quiet and dark living room. Logan's soft snoring could be heard from where he was passed out on the couch. Veronica shook her head and smirked, tip-toeing her way to the back of the couch, but stopped when the purple and black mottled skin covering Logan's ribs and shoulder caught her attention. A bottle of prescription pills sat opened on the coffee table beside a half empty glass of water. She couldn't stop the curiosity as she circled around the couch and picked up the bottle. The prescription had been filled in Neptune, two days before he showed up at her front door, ordering one pill as needed for pain control. Vicodin. No wonder he didn't wake up. He wouldn't have left this out intentionally for Veronica to find. He had probably meant to wake up before she got home and get rid of the evidence. She was three hours early after all.

Veronica racked her brain over the last few days, trying to remember if she had seen Logan's discomfort play across his features. Nothing came to mind. Even as they were getting thrown around on roller coasters two nights before. Her lips pursed as she stared at Logan's sleeping form angrily.

_Lucy! _she thought to herself as she settled into the chair across the room, pill bottle in hand. _You have some 'splaining to do!_


	9. Chapter 9

Okay, this is weird, but I was able to pull another update together! And I'm hoping to have enough creative juices to get this one finished soon! (Time pending of course. I'm coming into the last three weeks of the semester.) And I'm going to quickly apologize if anyone seems at all OOC. It's been sooo long since I've written for this fandom or have had enough time to watch some VM episodes.

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><p>Veronica sat with the bottle of Vicodin in her hand, waiting patiently as each second ticked by. She stared at the bruises that contrasted with Logan's sun-kissed skin, conflicted by the emotions raging through her. Anger was the most prominent; she was angry that Logan had inevitably done something stupid to deserve the bruises. Angry that he had tried to hide his injuries from her. Angry that he had succeeded. Fear followed closely behind that. She was afraid of the stupid act that had led him to become so badly beaten, of the people who were capable of doing this and had done this to him, and afraid of how much trouble he really was in. Finally, she was sympathetic to the pain and to his fear.<p>

As she sat, she allowed these emotions to war with each other. All she could do was stare at the starkly contrasting mottled skin and wait for him to wake up. It wasn't worth the fight. She knew this. They had just gotten back on good terms. She wasn't ready to start back down the road of distrust they were so desperately fighting to turn off of.

But she was a bit of a spitfire and she _wanted_ the fight so bad.

So she seethed and cried and worried for two hours, watching his chest rise and fall, waiting for him to wake up so she could just get it over with. He would come clean with her, whether he liked it or not. And she just had to keep reminding herself that she would not lose her temper. She would react calmly and collected.

She would.

Fifteen minutes before she would normally be walking in the door (a time she had only given him Friday morning when he asked), a blaring alarm began sounding from Logan's iPhone. She jumped and Logan shook himself awake, sitting up stiffly with a pained grunt. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands before reaching blindly for something on the table. His eyes shot open when his groping hand wrapped around air instead of a pill bottle. He began looking around the table and the floor beside the couch. Veronica shook the pill bottle coolly from where she sat across the room. Logan froze, turning to her slowly.

"Veronica, I can explain…" he started, climbing to his feet slowly. She watched him hold his right arm against his toned stomach tightly, immobilizing the shoulder.

"Sit, Logan," she ordered, but followed the sharp order with a much softer word of advice. "Don't strain yourself."

This gave Logan pause and he eyed her curiously. "Why aren't you mad?"

"Oh, I'm mad," she admitted, fighting the urge to launch herself at him from across the room. "I'm definitely infuriated right now. But I'm waiting for your story before I jump to a conclusion." She folded her arms across her chest. "The suspense is killing me, so get it over with."

Logan rapped his knuckles against the table lightly. "You're not going to like it."

"I'm fully aware of this," she acknowledged. Her eyebrows rose high on her forehead. "Still waiting."

Logan nodded. He explained how he was approached on his way back to his room, sparing no details as he described how he was beaten nearly to death. Gory's threat had held weight and the only reason he was alive still was because Papa Sorokin thought that Logan's actions were good for his growing son. He then continued to explain how he was being charged for possession with the intent to distribute. They were trying to ruin him. They were trying to make him _wish he was dead_.

"Sixty _thousand_ dollars?" Veronica asked, turning to face him from where she had been pacing the floor in front of him.

"It's not mine, Veronica," he insisted.

"Of course it's not," she said, resuming her pacing. The gears in her head were pouring steam out of her ears. Logan waited. He waited for her to explode like she normally would, to lecture him about how stupid it was to attack Gory in the middle of the food court all those weeks ago. He waited for her to berate him for leaving California when he was essentially under arrest. He waited for her disbelief and irritation for Logan's complete disregard for her reputation and her father's job as the sheriff. But those words never came from her mouth. Instead, she stopped pacing and looked at him despondently. "Logan…"

He looked down at the floor guiltily. He had nothing else to say. Or he was too surprised to find the words. Perhaps a bit of both.

"Logan, you…you shouldn't be here," she said slowly. "What the hell were you thinking?"

Logan finally did push himself up off the couch. "I need your help, Veronica."

"You left California while an investigation is being conducted regarding a cocaine possession," Veronica said, holding her hand up to stop him from saying anything else. _This is always how it goes with us._ "And the only place you thought to go was _my _apartment while I'm interning with the _Federal Bureau of Investigation_? This is aiding and abetting! I don't need _that_ to go on my record. Again." The disbelief in her voice made him feel stupid. She was the only one that would be able to help him. He knew that. "Of all the unbelievably moronic plans, Logan…!"

"Veronica, please," he said calmly. She stopped her tirade, the feeling of sympathy returning full force when she saw the pained look in his eyes. They stood silently for a long moment.

"You know the three strikes law," Logan said. "This is how Sorokin is trying to deal with me. This has got to be my third strike. He has to know that. And who knows how many of his goons are in the system? He's a mob boss. His reach goes on indefinitely. This isn't a matter of paying a large sum of money for a lawyer this time."

He needed her to help him find the evidence to incriminate the Sorokins and clear his name. Veronica nodded, moving around the table and sitting on the couch, pulling Logan down beside her. "How many times have you actually charged and found guilty?"

"By the state or the feds?"

"Logan…"

Logan shrugged. "I've had well-paid legal council to ensure any and all charges were dropped. I'm sure a few made their way onto my record. I also don't have the best personal history regarding my…distinct distaste for the American legal system."

Frowning in concern, she placed her hand on Logan's forearm. "O-okay…so how did you actually get out of California?"

* * *

><p>"<em>I've got to go," Logan insisted to Mac. Leo and his partner had left several hours later and per Logan's request, Mac and Dick were oblivious to his charges. It gave them plausible deniability. He had begun to formulate a plan the second Leo announced the charges. Step one was to get out of the hospital.<em>

"_Logan, dude," Dick said, sounding somewhat level headed and not Dick-like. "You have to stay here. You're not doing Ronnie any good if you go like this."_

_Logan was already half way off of the bed. It was painful but he could handle it. "Where are my clothes?"_

_Mac wordlessly handed him a bag and watched as he slowly and painstakingly changed into the clothes Dick and Mac had gotten him from the Neptune Grand. The pain in his shoulder was grating, forcing him to take several deep breaths to push through it to get his clothes on. When he was finished, he looked at his friends. "Okay, let's go."_

_They carefully snuck past the nurses' station and made their way down to the parking garage. Mac's Volkswagen Beetle was parked near the door and they all climbed into the car._

"_Did you get everything I asked for?" Logan asked, eyeing the duffle bag in the back of the car, hanging haphazardly off the seat beside Dick._

"_Everything," Mac assured him as Dick handed Logan his wallet and a bank envelope full of hundred dollar bills. "Don't you need to sign discharge papers?"_

_Logan waved it away. "Those are the least of their worries," he said evasively as he stared out the window. His plan was less than fool-proof, he knew this, but he could at least get a head start._

_At the airport, he hopped a plane to some random out of the way airport halfway across the country and rented a car from a small company and drove it to Virginia where he then rented something more his style and paid cash. He might only have a few days, but that was all he was going to need._

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><p>On the other side of the country, the Balboa County Sheriff's office was dedicating itself to locating Logan and bringing him in for further questioning concerning the recent drug bust in his hotel room. On a hunch, the sheriff had sent word to local police departments in Virginia to keep their eye out for Logan but had told them to hold off on any action until hearing from their office. Logan had run out of state, sending this case into the federal realm, but Keith had sweet talked the FBI into staying out. He would find Logan before anything happened.<p>

They had tracked Logan to an airport somewhere outside Cleveland, Ohio, but had lost him once he had turned off his cell and rented a car with cash. Logan had no one in Ohio, and even though Keith knew that Logan and Veronica were not on very good terms, he knew them both well enough to guess that was Logan's plan.

Veronica had never been able to say no to that boy when he was in real trouble.

The office was bustling with several officers following leads from the local offices in Virginia that were actually giving feedback, but when the secretary received a fax from the Stafford County Sheriff's Office, she snatched it out of the machine and nearly ran to Leo D'amato's desk with the traffic photo in her hand. Leo took the photo and recognized the familiar faces of Neptune's most notorious son and the sheriff's own oft-wayward daughter blowing through a red light in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Leo immediately went to Keith's office, photos in hand.

"Sheriff?" Leo asked, quietly from the doorway.

Keith Mars looked up from the file sitting in front of him on his desk. "Yeah, Leo. What's up?"

"I'm afraid that Veronica might be in the middle of this case involving Echolls."

Keith wasn't surprised, but this news was in no way appealing nonetheless. "I'm afraid to ask how."

Leo stepped into the office finally and dropped pictures on Keith's desk. "A traffic camera in Northern Virginia had caught a black Mustang running through a red light." In the front seat, Keith could clearly see the contented look on the driver's face and the smile on the passenger's. "Guess where he ran when he left on Thursday?"

Keith rubbed his face with his hands. "Well at least their back on less hostile terms," he quipped and rolled his eyes.

"She wouldn't let him ruin her chance with the FBI," Leo thought out loud. "Would she?"

"Logan has a way of getting her into things she may not want to be involved with," Keith hedged. "Think of him as kryptonite." Keith shook his head and handed the photos back to his deputy. "Thanks, Leo."

"Should I contact the Marshals?"

Keith shook his head. "I'll handle this one myself. Let's not involve federal aid until we absolutely need it. I don't want this ruining them too badly."

Leo smirked. "Okay."

Keith was already on his way out the door. "I'll be back in a day or two," he threw over his shoulder.


End file.
